Editorial: TAM should give 101 ideas a fair shake

THE LEADERS of the Transportation Authority of Marin only opened the door to wider public involvement after their plans for overhauling the Highway 101-Greenbrae interchange got such a public raspberry.

Complaints focused on the Los Angeles-style, cement-centric design, including a 33-foot-tall flyover from Sir Francis Drake Boulevard along southbound 101.

At TAM's public hearing, complaints and criticism about the design prepared by staff and Caltrans drowned out any praise. It was so lopsided that the TAM board decided to form a special "working group" to explore possible alternatives.

The group got several draft designs.

To live up to TAM's promise, these designs deserve to be vetted by structural and traffic engineers. They deserve to be compared with the version that TAM came up with. They deserve the same tests for traffic safety, engineering and traffic flow.

TAM's dilemma is that its public outreach included in its design process failed to engage the public. That is until the public got a look at the design that was nearly ready for the TAM board's approval.

Now it's forced to circle back.

In forming the working group and inviting alternatives, the TAM board is doing a lot of backpedaling. The effectiveness of this "back to the drawing board" move will depend on its genuine review of the proposals.

That may involve a significant public investment — $248,000, according to TAM staff.

We hope that using TAM and Caltrans staff to do the review can trim that cost, but it's important to have experts review the proposals.

The dilemma is the process is being conducted under the pressure of a presumed "use-it-or-lose it" deadline imposed by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, which approves the state money needed for the project.

MTC should be more interested in building the right project the right way than spending money on something that to many people is out of scale in design and spending.

The availability of money should not be the determining factor for selecting a design.

Besides, a lot of money was already spent advancing a project that the public shot down.

TAM leaders should have done a better job of making sure the community was actively involved in its process. At some point, TAM's board should have wondered why Marin's usually outspoken public was so quiet about its plans.

TAM is now trying to rescue a process that went sideways. It is trying to reconnect with the public.

Besides money, it's going to take an investment of time.

MTC should give TAM the leeway to do the job right — with a reasonable increase in funding and adequate time to find a real public consensus.

The process should be driven by coming up with the best design, not by bureaucratic deadlines.